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March 29, 2015

I have returned to Middle Earth! And to start the deluge of posts dedicated to this beloved film series (currently sitting at six films), I thought I'd share some of the striking visuals from the first film in The Lord of the Rings series, The Fellowship of the Ring.

Director Peter Jackson had to impress with the first film in the trilogy to have folks buy in to the dense concept. Unlike the other two entries in this trilogy and the follow-up prequel series The Hobbit, The Fellowship of the Ring is the most 'real' of the saga. Though there is CGI, there seemed to be a larger emphasis on location shooting and model work.

Fitting with a film series that, if you include the extended cuts, runs for 681 minutes, The Fellowship of the Ring takes its time setting up the mythos and, unlike other films in the series, it dedicates long takes and picturesque visuals to set a large, legendary mood. Below are those, and many other, moments depicting the visual spectacle that is Fellowship of the Ring.

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The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
Director: Peter Jackson
Cinematographer: Andrew Lesnie

February 9, 2015

Before I write a review of Carrie (yes, yes, the 2013 version), I wanted to share some of the striking visuals from the film. Carrie is not necessarily a freeze-frame type of film that I'd usually display here. The accomplishment is a little more psychological. A lot of the crisp, HD images are used as a ironic counterpart to the film's grimy feel ... the film kind of embodies the process of puberty.

That said, there are still some cool looking 'picture' shots. Thanks to KissThemGoodbye, a website I found by chance doing a Google image search. They have a lot of other screen caps so if you're looking for some, go check them out.

January 31, 2015

It is not often that I find a film that seems to exist for the sole purpose of pleasing me. I have been blessed on very few occasions to sit down at a movie theater and watch as a studio spends millions of dollars and, presumably, lots of research and development into mind reading technology, displaying a motion picture tailor made for my brain. A Most Violent Year is A24's (the distributing studio) love note to me ... and I can only thank them with an $8.50 matinee fee, a DVD sale and a glowing review.

Now, A Most Violent Year, for many, may be the most disappointing film of the century. As Hollywood is want to do, they are selling this fucker hard as about forty different things. The main selling point seems to be that the movie is basically the second coming of Goodfellas and, like its title suggests, will be the most ultraviolet crime thriller of all time. So yeah, if you're going in expecting that, you might be pretty bored or pissed off.

But if you've got an open mind, plus a working knowledge of Hollywood's bullshit, you may be treated to a genre busting morality tale that rivals ... and yes, I am about to say this ... the intellectual power of The Godfather.

The amazing aspect of A Most Violent Year is it's attempt to bring a new voice to the 'gangster' genre. Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola, for better and worse, have stamped the crime genre with their footprint and most movies try (and mostly fail) to duplicate those director's work of genius. Don't get me wrong, some have matched or maneuvered around the created tropes to create genuinely compelling works of art (Mike Newell's Donnie Brasco comes to mind) but many stick to the formula.

A Most Violent Year's core strength is subtly deconstructing the gangster genre by posing what could be, in superhero genre terms, an origin story ... hell maybe even a Christ figure story ... of a man walking the line between civilian and mobster. But the film has only shadows of 'gangster' to it. In a sense, this is blue collar near-mobality (trademark to me please). The movie's main character, Abel Morales (Oscar Isaac) is an on-the-rise oil mogul. But don't get it twisted: there aren't fancy boardrooms and insane cars. Abel is fairly wealthy ... but like the film's other approaches to things such as violence and corporate intrigue ... it is a drab wealth. It is probably a realistic wealth.

Abel's desired location for his empire is not flashy or fancy. It is crude and grey. It is not something you desire to own unless you desire to work in that field. Most gangster movies try to show the style and excess of success. And yes, some people live that lifestyle ... but for most in the real world, money making operations aren't fancy, they're dirty and non-luxurious.

But even the 'flashy' components Abel surrounds himself with like a drab, ugly mansion and a modest looking Mercedes, feel more 'real'. The director J.C. Candor and his art direction team take the pomp and circumstance and the often exaggerated mythic quality of the gangster flick out of this film.

But here I am, talking about Abel as a 'gangster' when he is anything but. In fact, the film has less plot and more examination to it, the examination being a very David Mamet-like approach to a man's conscious when surrounded by gangsters: what lines will he cross and what won't he cross. Like the film itself, Abel is trying to defy the expectations placed on him by his ethnic background, fancy hair and dress, the business he works in and the connections to gangsters he inherited (his wife is the daughter of a now-jailed, ambiguously labeled gangster, though that is never made explicitly clear). Abel is our hero but he is almost a Shakespearean character from one of his tragedies. His tragic flaw is his conscious and the entire film relies on the testing of that conscious, and the good and bad side of actually having one ... and yes, there can be a negative aspect to having a conscious ...

But unlike other films of its ilk, the conscious challenges are not like 'will he start to kill' or something similar. It is 'how can I impress the loan manager at the bank that I am a guy you can trust' or 'can I loan cash from person A or person B when either A and B is really against me'. It is both mundane and revolutionary.

Oscar Isaac is getting lots of praise but where I have heard complaints is that his character is almost like a walking metaphor and not real flesh and blood. And, partially, I can agree. Like any good Mamet play, Abel is more then just flesh and blood. He is kind of the personification of the inner struggle and sometimes his psychological plight takes over the actual realism of his character. But that isn't exactly a drawback for me ... because the film is, in the end, a morality tale, a metaphysical tragedy wrapped in a genre breaking film.

Isaac is pretty incredible to watch and as his morality goes from noble to unnerving to nearly deadly, the audience debates the values one can have in life. Abel seems unable to accept ANY compromises but sometimes, or at least we think, compromises have to be made. And while people complain about his, perhaps, overwritten part ... the actor sells it. Isaac is a star waiting to happen.

The rest of the cast is phenomenal as well. Jessica Chastain plays Abel's wife, an Armani wearing ticking time bomb who threatens to unravel Abel's stability all while being his most dedicated supporter. Albert Brooks continues to play against type as a shady lawyer while actors like Elyes Gabel, David Oyelowo and Alessandro Nivola play small, but charismatic, roles.

The best actor in the whole thing though is New York City. Taking place in 1981, flawlessly recreated by the design team and a marvelous cinematographer in Bradford Young, New York is simultaneously beautiful and grimy. Many have compared it to Sidney Lumet ... I tend to agree as many of the on location shooting reminded me of some of the dirtiest sections of Serpico.

A marvelous character study with amazing acting and production, the film was made just for me but it may also be made for you too.

Now, while Star Trek is a drama, it tends to be a softer view of the future. The show is more allegorical than anything else, so the realm of science, philosophy and morality are explored, not necessarily horror and suspense. And though we are talking about spaceships and aliens with big ridges on their heads, the show certainly tries to keep things grounded. But producing over 750 hours of television and 12 feature films can sap you of ideas from time to time. And when that happened, Star Trek revealed some truly freaky ass shit.

Here are nine examples of when things got crazy (and freaky)*:

*note: I've only watched Voyager and Enterprise sparingly so I've excluded them from this list. I only added episodes of TNG and DS9 as well as some of the films. Hey, I never said this was a comprehensive study! If you know of any freaky moments from TOS, VOY, or ENT, let me know in the comment.

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Speak of the Devil: "Conspiracy" (TNG, Season 1, episode 25)

This is kind of the champion of freaky ass Star Trek. Sure, you can see stuff like this in a horror flick but ... this is Star Trek! The show with jumpsuits, technobabble and elfin merchants with weird ears. How can what happens in the video above be real?!

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That Was Unexpected: "Empok Nor" (DS9, Season 5, Episode 24)

There have been plenty of murder mysteries in Star Trek. There have also been some pretty eerie deaths and such but one thing Star Trek never does is do anything simple. So when DS9's writers got towards the end of season 5 (and the end of ideas for that year), they decided to do a haunted house episode in space and took all the Star Trek out of it, injecting horror and brutality in its place.

Just watch the first forty seconds of the clip above. I can argue, in terms of quick and brutal deaths, maybe only the films can match the uncharacteristic violence of the above clip. 'Empok Nor' is certainly a deep cut episode of DS9 and that is mostly because it is one of the least Star Trek episodes of that series, let alone the franchise.

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Just ... No: "Night Terrors" (TNG, Season 4, Episode 17)

Okay. That was odd.

O .... kay. This is getting wei ...

NO. NOOOO. NO. Just NO! Stop it. *cries*

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Right. Next. To. You: "Identity Crisis" (TNG, Season 4, Episode 18)

Two episodes that freak me out ... back to back. Though lacking the horror tropes of "Night Terrors", "Identity Crisis" offers its own chills. When Geordi uses the holodeck to investigate a mission from his past in which he and a friend were possibly infected with an unknown disease, he discovers that there was an invisible guest that was with him that day. As he slowly deletes all the holographic copies of his old crewmates from the program trying to determine why he sees multiple shadows reflecting off a wall, he is left with just himself and a lone shadow ... apparently coming from no one.

I've posted a video of the investigation below. However, the YouTube user who posted it recorded it off a live TV so it lacks the impact of seeing this truly eerie moment for the first time and with TNG's amazing production value (the use of lighting was especially effective in the scene). I watched this for the first time in the hospital when my appendix exploded and I had trouble sleeping all alone in my hospital room that night.

Odo Goes the Way of The Thing: "The Alternate" (DS9, Season 2, Episode 12)

Long before it was determined that Odo was a Founder and long before we even knew what a Founder was, DS9's early seasons dealt with Odo trying to find his origins. In this early run episode, Odo visits a planet and finds life similar to himself. Naturally, the DS9 crew take it back on the station and the life form starts executing and attacking people like a gooey slasher would ... in darkened rooms and poorly lit corridors.

In the end, we find out Odo is the gooey slasher thing and has had a bit of a multiple personality disorder since returning from the planet. Add 'daddy' issues and ... well ... you've got a rampaging blob on the loose.

Turning away from more typical Star Trek fare with its approach to alien races (or, in this case, infections), 'The Alternate' is dark, moody and uncharacteristically creepy.

*The Best I Could Find Was At 1:29 on the video

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A New Kind of Wet Willy: "Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan" (film, 1982)

So ... uh ... that happened. Little, slimy creatures are gross enough. But forcibly putting them in someones ears is extra gross! This disturbing display of body horror is a rare sequence in a franchise dedicated to wonder, not chills.

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Data Myers: "Phantasms" (TNG, Season 7, Episode 6)

So yeah, that is how the episode starts (the YouTube user edited it to make it a bit longer). Eerie enough. But like any good use of tension, comedic relief is necessary and 'Phantasms", an episode in which Data experiments with dreaming, is full of funny moments. Some, as in the clip below, that occur right before the episodes more freaktastic moments.

It is hard to believe that of all the TNG seasons there were, Season 7 was the one chosen by the Emmys to be nominated for Best Dramatic Series. The season is so crazy and tone def (besides 'Phantasms', there were episodes about Data being inhabited by an ancient culture ("Masks"), Beverly Crusher getting fucked by a ghost ("Sub Rosa"), and Geordi being visited by his dead mom's ghost ("Interface"); there were also episodes about adding a speed limit to the universe ("Force of Nature"), comedic character Lwaxana Troi's loss of her young child ("Dark Page") and the crew all devolving and attacking people ("Genesis")) yet visually effective. "Phantasms" is an example of Star Trek going outside its boundaries and freaking you out.

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Caveman Riker! "Genesis" (TNG, Season 7, Episode 19)

As mentioned above, Season 7 TNG is weird. Though not as freaky as "Phantasms", "Genesis" deals with the more literal problem of the entire crew devolving into ... well ... monsters. Barclay turns into a Spider, Troi turns into a lizard thing, Nurse Ogawa turns into Zira the ape, Riker turns into a caveman and Worf becomes PREDATOR WORF!

"Genesis" benefits from putting the familiar, comfy settings of Star Trek into bizarro versions of itself. And, in a rare twist, Picard's devolution (which is delayed) is to be the Final Girl who squares off against the big bad at episode's end.

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Space Zombies: "Star Trek: First Contact" (film, 1996)

Donald Marshall of GeeksOn called Star Trek: First Contact, arguably the most commercially successful and one of two of the most critically applauded Trek films, as "Night of the Living Dead in space" and nothing could be more true.

After having shared their first film with the original crew, the Next Generation cast got their own picture and completely owned it. But they also played against type. In the series first PG-13 film, there were multiple scenes of body horror, torture and just plain spookiness. It's not only a great film but also a perfect blend of Star Trek's philosophical ideals and freaky scares.